9:37 AM: Jorge Posada still wants to play baseball, and today Jon Heyman tweets that he’s reached out to the Mets to see if they’d be interested.

Hard to see why they, or most anyone else actually, would be. Most teams like their backup catchers to have some defensive skills. Nothin’ personal, but Posada simply doesn’t anymore. And his 2011 line of .235/.315/.398 isn’t strong enough to justify a DH gig anyplace.

As much fun as it has been to watch Jorge Posada over the years, I can’t help but think that he’s going to, at best, get a spring training invite from someone with no accompanying major league deal. And that at some point in early-to-mid March he’ll have a press conference in Tampa in which he announces his retirement.

If Posada is truly interested in playing in 2012 then he really needs to concentrate his efforts on an AL team when he can at least DH and very, very occasionally back up the every day starter. Even at that unfortunately 2011 showed most everyone that Posada even as a DH can only be used against right handed pitches. Against lefties he’s virtually an automatic out.

The hardest thing it seems like for athletes to do is recognize when it’s time to hang it up. I think Posada needs to take a serious look in the mirror and see how he wants to be remembered. As someone who just didn’t know when it was time or someone who had a very good 2011 ALDS before he retired.

Posada came up through the minors as a second baseman before being converted to catcher.

uyf1950 - Dec 1, 2011 at 10:40 AM

bozosforall – I’m not sure if you are making a general comment or if you are implying that because Posada played 2nd base in the minors as roughly a 20 year old that he is still capable of playing it at the ML level at 40 going on 41 years old even part time.

Guy’s I’m with phukyouk. Because the last time and only time I can see where Posada played 2nd base for a Yankees minor league team was in 1991 at the age of 19 in Oneonta in A-. He appeared in 64 games that year at 2nd base and committed 20 errors. I believe that is the extent of his experience at 2nd base in the Yankees minor league system.

I appreciate all that he did for the Yankees, but even in the days of yore, he was never a good catcher. He could hit, so that was overlooked, but now that age has caught up and he’s below average with the bat, his contributions to a team are extremely limited and I’m sure he’s not willing to play for the vet minimum. Just retire in the pinstrips, Jorge.

Let’s not treat Jorge’s defense so harshly. His framing of pitches has always been poor (except when he was catching Rivera, but such is the power of Mo), his throwing was sub-par and his block of pitches in the dirt was mediocre (when he was in his prime) to abysmal (the later years), but he always had a good working relationship with the pitchers. There are plenty of catchers who have gotten starting jobs with the same defensive skill set and less offensive production (Jason Kendall comes to mind). A good catcher is hard to find, is what I’m saying.

uyf1950 – Dec 1, 2011 at 10:40 AM
bozosforall – I’m not sure if you are making a general comment or if you are implying that because Posada played 2nd base in the minors as roughly a 20 year old that he is still capable of playing it at the ML level at 40 going on 41 years old even part time.

Because to be perfectly honest I’m not sure I can equate the two.

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Just background info.

Of course, he’s not currently qualified to play at second base. But once upon a time…